Rick Rugani, President of the Bronxville Board of Education, opened the October meeting by addressing the larger financial outlook across the state and the potential impact on our school district. Mr. Rugani remarked that while the full impact is yet to be defined, we are likely to encounter revenue shortfalls in both state aid and sales tax.
State budget deficits have prompted the Governor to reconsider the full range of state programs, including distributions to schools in the current year. "We may not have these revenues at the same level, " he said. "We have to be preparing ourselves as we put this next budget together." Assistant Superintendent Dan Carlin commented that we will know more in the next few weeks, adding that about 5% of our total budget depends on state aid.
Referring to expenditures, Mr. Rugani added that "Most of our spending isn't discretionary, but in this environment we need to do what we can to conserve dollars. . . Next year we need to approach the budget with an eye toward managing these costs even more carefully."
